What I did for Summer Vacation

Pro bono filmmaking

3 min readSep 3, 2019

As a volunteer, I worked on a feature film, a SAG short film, and a sketch comedy web series this past July. This is what I did over summer vacation.

This past year I’ve been working on a feature film and I’ve been trying to wrap a number of short film projects. Last fall I got addicted to Fortnite (more about that in a later article) and I was dealing with the frustrations of trying to distribute a short film.

Redlining, a short film I produced (more on this in another article) started getting selected by film festivals.

In June, I was still feeling some burn out and strapped for cash, but I wanted get on a film set again.

I manage a monthly meetup in Chicago for filmmakers (more on that later), so I emailed the list saying I was willing to work as pro-bono crew. I was specifically looking for work as a production assistant, but with my experience I could help in a number of ways on set. In the initial email I listed my experience on set, along with the preference of roles I was willing to take on. I wanted a role where I could arrive on set on the day of filming and go to work. I wasn’t interested in coordinating or location scouting ahead of a shoot. Also, if I could find a position that didn’t have a lot of decision making responsibility that was preferable.

Pretty quickly other members in the group reached out. When you’re a no to low budget filmmaker, if someone offers to work for free, you’ll try to hire them.

A couple offers didn’t seem to be a good fit, and they didn’t lead to a collaboration, but my email led to the opportunity of working on three very different sets with different directors. I had a good experience.

Usually when I’m on set, I’m taking on a number of tasks, (directing, shooting, first ADing, etc.) So it was great being on set as a Production assistant. Because of my experience I was able to help out with lighting, with sound, and a number of other gaps that tend to turn up on a small indie set.

Because of this experience, I got to see how three directors ran their film shoots. I also learned about some of the particulars of working on a SAG set, and it led to a couple paid gigs.

If you have time to work pro bono, I recommend trying it out. Despite how long you’ve been filmmaking, taking a weekend to work on someone’s film project can give you an opportunity to learn new things and meet other filmmakers outside of your circle of friends and associates. It can also give you an opportunity to learn more in a department in which you don’t have as much experience. In my email I mentioned I was interested in helping the lighting department and on one of the shoots I was able to help the Grips on set.

That’s what I did over summer vacation.